My daughter-in-law received 2nd degree chemical burns on her

Customer Question

My daughter-in-law received 2nd degree chemical burns on her bottom, and her "girl parts" after a surgery, due to the batidine pre cleanser being left on a pad/sheet that she was laying on during surgery. The hospital has contacted her and has told her that they are zeroing out the charges for her surgery. Also, their attorney has contacted her wanting to set up a meeting to reach a settlement amount. She wants to be fair about the entire situation, but she currently still has numbness in some areas and very sensitive in others. The surgery was 3 months ago. Also, at the time this happened, she went to the ER the day following surgery(same hospital) and no one wanted to offer any help, offer support, or compassion. She was told that "she needed to learn to deal with pain!" 😳 She was sent to wound care to verify the degree of the burns, still no compassion, just very "matter a fact" Keep in mind she had cervical cancer removed the day before, then second degree burns on areas that make it difficult to walk, and she was sent from place to place and then to her doctors office the day after surgery! She was exhausted and then bleeding from being up too much. It was a horrible experience to say the least!Now as I said, she wants to be fair about the settlement, but really isn't sure what "fair" is. Could you recommend a number that sounds fair to you please? Thank you!

Generally, you look at a settlement amount from two main aspects: (1) medical bills and (2) lost wages. From a starting point, most PI attorneys will demand 3-4 times these amounts as an initial demand and then negotiate downward until settlement is reached.

There's no real science to it....you just make a demand on what you would be willing to accept, and stick to the numbers based on what you think your chances at trial would be in the event that you can't settle. In other words, if you believe that there's no question about liability, you can be more confident in your numbers and not budging as fast as you would if you think the case has some questions or issues that could cut against you.